Access to certain IP addresses fails with excede

I manage a forum website for Ozarks Neighborly Exchange, and several users (who get their Internet service through exede) cannot connect to the website, although others besides me have no problem doing so. Users of several different ISPs are also able to connect.

I suspect it's an exede issue. I have given my users this alternate URL to try, but none are able to connect to the forum server, and several report being redirected to a site with foreign language. The web server's primary URL is http://ozarksneighborlyexchange.com/ which corresponds to http://82.200.17.129/ (the alternate URL to eliminate DNS as the issue). The exede users can't connect with that either, so it is not likely a DNS problem, but rather something much more significant.

If any of you exede users would try those URLs and post as to your success or failure it may help to understand the issue. If you're concerned this post is an attempt to get you to click into a phishing site don't be. Use your favorite search engine to search for "Ozarks Neighborly Exchange" and click that link and report back what you get. Do the search results match the description? If you're savvy with the command line do a ping to the name (ping ozarksneighborlyexchange.com) and the IP address (ping 82.200.17.129) and report back what you find.

It is difficult, even for an tech-know-geek like myself with over 2 decades of Internet experience to understand where the plumbing has gone astray. It should be very disconcerting to everyone, but especially exede users because this problem reflects on your ability to correctly address and reach certain segments of the Internet.

Our desk top computer connects using the wildblue email address, none of our iPads can send email using the same e mail as our desk too, I have spoken to higher tech support levels who assure me it should work, does not work ever since wildblue went to the new platform, All IPads can receive mail but can not send mail, aggravating, wildblue suggested I call Apple, no it is not Apple, IPads used to work!

I was actually going in from a non Exede ramp. Cable modem on a system just outside Charlottesville VA. It wasn't properly resolving there recently. I do know if you recently changed the domain name server it can sometimes take 24-72 hours for servers to catchup to the new settings. We develop websites and run into this pretty often when changing a DNS. Exede servers could be very slow picking it up. If you go through a proxy window like Megaproxy, does it resolve correctly? That bypasses Exede so to speak and gives you a clearer shot.

I switched the hosting service of the O.N.E. site well over a month ago, so any changes to DNS would be propogated by now. Not only that, but my exede users have just started experiencing this problem, they've been able to access the site since it was switched. Besides, using the IP address takes DNS out of the picture entirely. This is a major issue for exede users. How can they be sure they're getting to the genuine servers or are not just getting pointed to a duplicate? Server certificates help with that but there are tons of sites that don't use them. This seems to be a routing problem of some sort, or a misconfiguration of network routing somewhere in the path exede sources it's Internet from. I've never seen this type of IP address issue before. Seen plenty of DNS issues, but not IP address issues like this for an entire ISP.

Now you did bring an interesting piece of the puzzle to light here Tommy, in that you're the first person that can't reach the site using an ISP other than exede. Could you provide more info on that ISP? You say it's in Virginia. What is the name of that ISP?

Got it. Just know when i looked earlier (wish I'd taken a screenshot) not from an Exede ramp the actual irk said server couldn't be found. When o clicked the actual a numerical address it took me to something in foreign language. So not sure where the problem lies. I'll check from my Exede connection shortly.

I am sympathetic to your tech woes. However, just to let you know, it doesn't sound like the issues you describe are related to those I'm having, aside from the fact exede may be the common denominator!

One of my customers last year had the same issue with email you describe, and it was related to changes exede / wildblue made to their email service. Exede made it quite unnecessarily difficult to get the information required to fix the issue, tho it was a simple issue. All they had to do was put a link in the notification email they sent out describing the changes they made and the information required to fix it, but they make everyone hunt it down, which took me awhile to find.

Perhaps your issue is nothing more than some minor adjustments to your email client configuration. You probably just need the correct SMTP address, which changed last year. Then, if you're not tech savvy you will need guidance on how to change it on your devices. If you can get to youtube to search for answers that is one path you could follow.

Thanks Charles. It doesn't impact the issue, but FYI the cached and current links in your reply are the same. The fact people in other parts of the country are having the same problem is strong evidence this is a major issue with exede, since it doesn't affect any of the other ISPs.

I hope to hear from other exede users north or south of me, as it's possible I guess it's the latitude (or is it longitude, I never remember which is which :) where the failure is present.

No luck with either way.(in eastern NC). I do not know what the site is(using ip method) but it knew the ip address of my web site and I don't have the server working yet. I do not recommend that anyone with exede access this site until this is resolved. I am also going to take every precaution to ensure I haven't picked up something nasty.

I learned something new about the DNS today. I always thought the DNS was merely a name service, and if one knew the correct IP address any server on the Internet was reachable. I should have known better, but I never gave it too much thought.

The DNS is the central mechanism to how names AND Internet traffic is routed. It is the Internet's "Achilles heel".

The problem I discovered was that the registrar for the ozarksneighborlyexchange.com domain, NAMECHEAP, screwed up the DNSSEC record which is a security mechanism used to validate updates to the DNS. They are working to correct the error, but it has left a very bad impression and I will not use NAMECHEAP as a domain registrar in the future.